Mercato Team (Ausilio, Marotta, & Co.) and Strategies

[ADRossi]

It's hard to look back at this summer and consider it anything less than a complete failure. The bigger picture is that we've woefully managed multiple players' contract situations (Brozovic, Skriniar, de Vrij, and Sanchez), and it's going to make future Mercatos even more challenging.

 

[RickyMaravilla'sRightFoot]

I don’t see how you could possibly make an argument that any of our past 3 mercatos have been acceptable.

I blame Suning but also Marotta. Yeah Suning is the catalyst, but Marotta has whiffed nearly every major decision we have had to make in the past year and a half. It’s been discussed at length above.

I don’t have much of a beef with Ausilio. I think he’s good at what he does and has proven loyal. I’m not sure he’s up to the task of being the main man but he’s someone I’d definitely keep around.

 

[brehme1989]

I don’t have much of a beef with Ausilio. I think he’s good at what he does and has proven loyal. I’m not sure he’s up to the task of being the main man but he’s someone I’d definitely keep around.

The concept this summer was that Marotta was in charge of buying and Ausilio "in charge" of selling.
They sort of clashed from what I hear because Marotta pretty much ordered him to sell Bastoni, eventually we shifted to the Ausilio mode only to have that blocked and returned to trying to sell Skriniar instead. So Ausilio wasn't left to make whatever move was needed to sell De Vrij, Dumfries and whomever else was needed to be sold in order to finance the moves that Marotta wanted to get done; Bremer and Dybala. Getting Lukaku destroyed whatever strategy we had laid out and Ausilio got on board with the need to sell a big name in order to proceed with the rest of the moves.
So Ausilio isn't really in charge, he just gets to run the errands that Marotta assigns him to run, but truth is that Inzaghi also played a part in the mercato by blocking several exits mostly, like Dumfries at one point, as well as expressing disappointment that Skriniar and Bastoni were about to be sold by the management.

Ausilio has a great eye for talent and is very well connected in Italy and arguably well connected in Europe. He'd be useful to have around but he's not your main guy. He's a football guy, he's not a negotiator or a man manager, at least not inherently. Not sure if he can pull that off, but it's possible. It's a role he didn't have but apparently fans believe he has.


People say that Mourinho is outdated from modern football and has lost his touch, but I think that's more applicable to Marotta who's a dinosaur in the sport. He doesn't understand that players have the power now and he's no longer at Juventus with all rivals killed off by FIGC or by seppuku, with infinite funds coming in and everyone in Italy saying yes to him.

We need someone who's more in touch with modern football in that role. I'd give the job to an ex-player and iirc we had a deal with Bocconi in the last 20 years or so, so a lot of our former players have Business Administration/Management/Economics/Sports Management degrees. I'd give Ivan Cordoba a chance for example, seems to have the personality and the academic background to support this role. And loves Inter.

 

[Glass box]

I don’t see how you could possibly make an argument that any of our past 3 mercatos have been acceptable.

I blame Suning but also Marotta. Yeah Suning is the catalyst, but Marotta has whiffed nearly every major decision we have had to make in the past year and a half. It’s been discussed at length above.

I don’t have much of a beef with Ausilio. I think he’s good at what he does and has proven loyal. I’m not sure he’s up to the task of being the main man but he’s someone I’d definitely keep around.

Marotta should've went for targets within the budget instead of giving Inter fans a semi for Dybala, Bremer, Tonali etc. and failed to sign any of them.

 

[brehme1989]

Marotta should've went for targets within the budget instead of giving Inter fans a semi for Dybala, Bremer, Tonali etc. and failed to sign any of them.

They were within our budget but he either delayed so much that they ended up being off our budget or he changed his mind and opted for another choice.

Bremer was ours to be had for much less than he went to Juventus but we delayed too much to seal the deal. Could have been wrapped from February at 25-30m, before his new deal with Torino.
Dybala could have been had but he wanted to bring Lukaku in (I guess Zhang also asked for that to happen) and he delayed too much to send Sanchez home because he wouldn't pay him what he wanted initially. Ended up giving him exactly that 1.5 months later!
Tonali was a done deal but we delayed to seal it and then let him move to Milan whilst we preferred Vidal.


Frattesi was also a target but we decided against it because we didn't want to give money to Roma... But we're happy to throw money in a well.

 

[Linege]

working within our budget= more players like bellanova and asllani

no, thanks

we dont have money, so hard measures

skriniar should be sold
dumfries too
big no for lukaku
big no for mkha
sanchez and sensi should be here, perisic too

and go for proper players like bremer, dybala etc

 

[Il Drago]

I don’t see how you could possibly make an argument that any of our past 3 mercatos have been acceptable.

I blame Suning but also Marotta. Yeah Suning is the catalyst, but Marotta has whiffed nearly every major decision we have had to make in the past year and a half. It’s been discussed at length above.

I don’t have much of a beef with Ausilio. I think he’s good at what he does and has proven loyal. I’m not sure he’s up to the task of being the main man but he’s someone I’d definitely keep around.

I disagree about the first two mercatos. I think he did more than a decent job considering Suning demands.

Hakan was probably the best and cheapest Eriksen replacement we could have afforded at the time. Dumfries is more than a decent Hakimi replacement. People complained he sold Hakimi on the cheap but it was in top 3 of highest fees for a fullback/wingback. Lukaku sale looks like a real masterclass now. Dzeko contribution has been decent considering he came at a low cost. His main mistake in that summer was Correa but we sold Lukaku late, he was only a last resort and went for him only when everyone else was injured.

In January he signed Gosens as a future Perisic replacement. On paper it looked like a good deal. Personally i had some objections but most people were feeling positive about it. People complain about losing Perisic on a free but when you need to cut wage bill veterans are the first to go, no matter how important they are. I don't see it as a mistake. The problem is you failed to replace him because Inzaghi hasn't got anything from Gosens.

No doubt he dropped the ball last summer.

My biggest issue with Marotta is the way he handled extensions and the lack of a proper plan. First he wanted to sell Bastoni, then Skriniar and basically we would have sold anyone who would have brought an offer. This isn't the way to build a squad, even in a bad financial situation.

 

[YoramG]

I am starting to lean more towards needing a complete revamp of the management. I'd still keep Marotta around, but something like Rummenige + Giuntoli might be good.

New ideas are desperately needed if the financial future is as bleak as it has been.

 

[dax21]

I'd give Ivan Cordoba a chance for example, seems to have the personality and the academic background to support this role. And loves Inter.

He already has that job, at Venezia.

 

[CafeCordoba]

The concept this summer was that Marotta was in charge of buying and Ausilio "in charge" of selling.
They sort of clashed from what I hear because Marotta pretty much ordered him to sell Bastoni, eventually we shifted to the Ausilio mode only to have that blocked and returned to trying to sell Skriniar instead. So Ausilio wasn't left to make whatever move was needed to sell De Vrij, Dumfries and whomever else was needed to be sold in order to finance the moves that Marotta wanted to get done; Bremer and Dybala. Getting Lukaku destroyed whatever strategy we had laid out and Ausilio got on board with the need to sell a big name in order to proceed with the rest of the moves.
So Ausilio isn't really in charge, he just gets to run the errands that Marotta assigns him to run, but truth is that Inzaghi also played a part in the mercato by blocking several exits mostly, like Dumfries at one point, as well as expressing disappointment that Skriniar and Bastoni were about to be sold by the management.

Ausilio has a great eye for talent and is very well connected in Italy and arguably well connected in Europe. He'd be useful to have around but he's not your main guy. He's a football guy, he's not a negotiator or a man manager, at least not inherently. Not sure if he can pull that off, but it's possible. It's a role he didn't have but apparently fans believe he has.


People say that Mourinho is outdated from modern football and has lost his touch, but I think that's more applicable to Marotta who's a dinosaur in the sport. He doesn't understand that players have the power now and he's no longer at Juventus with all rivals killed off by FIGC or by seppuku, with infinite funds coming in and everyone in Italy saying yes to him.

We need someone who's more in touch with modern football in that role. I'd give the job to an ex-player and iirc we had a deal with Bocconi in the last 20 years or so, so a lot of our former players have Business Administration/Management/Economics/Sports Management degrees. I'd give Ivan Cordoba a chance for example, seems to have the personality and the academic background to support this role. And loves Inter.

I agree on most part on this.

I feel Marotta will be out if Zhangs leave as the project will be most probably about rebuilding with lesser resources. And Marotta might be tired of that, doing it already once here. If he's looking for retirement regarding management business in football (and shifting to association level). Marotta might be a bit of a dinosaur and his methods might be outdated. But I feel the owners have seriously affected his work and it hasn't been easy scrambling there.

Regarding Ausilio, 100%. He's still doing a good job.

 

[Stefan]

I don’t see how you could possibly make an argument that any of our past 3 mercatos have been acceptable.

I blame Suning but also Marotta. Yeah Suning is the catalyst, but Marotta has whiffed nearly every major decision we have had to make in the past year and a half. It’s been discussed at length above.

I don’t have much of a beef with Ausilio. I think he’s good at what he does and has proven loyal. I’m not sure he’s up to the task of being the main man but he’s someone I’d definitely keep around.

4, the January mercato during the scudetto was also dreadful as we did nothing.

 

[Nerazzurri_Ninja]

new young players pls

 

[Il Drago]

4, the January mercato during the scudetto was also dreadful as we did nothing.

Suning didn't even pay salaries back then.

 

[dragondance]

I don't like most of Inter's decisions in the summer but at the same time, I think Marotta's job is ridiculously difficult. He has good connections and is good at convincing players to come even before we make the first offer to the club (which is a great strategy), but without a decent budget, his arms are tied. If Suning doesn't have financial problems, Marotta could have easily sealed Bremer , Dybala, and any other realistic targets.
Now Marotta has a negative budget to work with every summer. He made mistakes, but any director will find it extremely hard to succeed here until financial problems are sorted out.

Inter are a ship without a direction now. Are we still a serious club that wants to win silverware? In order to win, you need to spend, not selling best players every transfer window. Are we a selling club now? To be a selling club, we need to buy promising players, play them and accept that we are not gonna win anything soon. We are kinda stuck in between, it's hard to find reasons why any good director would want to come in this situation.

 

[CafeCordoba]

Yes we are a selling club for as long as Zhangs are here. Maybe even after that but I could guess our strategy will change by then. Let's hope for that moment to occur sooner than later!

 

[Glass box]

I was thinking if Marotta played 4D chess for himself and his future under the inevitable new Inter ownership a little bit.

So he "secured" players that were out of our budget to show: "Here is what I can do, I can convince good players to come, I just need a little bit more money to do it but not with these finances" to show to potential new buyers he is capable. It's probably not on purpose, I know it's far fetched, but it does create the picture.

 

[wera]

Dzeko's contract expires at the end of this season. No need to extend it and Lukaku's anymore. Firminio and Thuram plus another back up forward would be good enough for the next season.

We all know we won't extend Lukaku.
We also NEED to sell Correa. He is horrible.
I'm sure we'll extend Džeko for one more year, because he'd be great if used sparringly.

If we lose Lukaku, Correa and Džeko in the same summer, I'm not so sure we'll just manage to get Firmino and Thuram. There are other teams that want strikers too. Even if Lukaku and Džeko leave, we will have Lautaro, Correa and maybe a young striker or two while TRYING to get a free agent to come here.

Everybody knows we have money issues. We also need to be top4 or NOBODY of note will come to Inter.

 

[CafeCordoba]

Forward issue is very interesting one indeed for the next summer. This discussion already started in Lukaku thread but I decided to move it here, starting from wera's post.

New players:

Names Firmino, Thuram and Muriel have been mentioned as the free agents. IMO we can sign these guys, even the first two if we will have only Lautaro here. Because we can promise a fair battle for minutes for these free agents. Liverpool will have Nunez as their go-to guy now so Firmino will be just a rotation option. As for Thuram, Inter would be a step up from his current club. Of course there are other clubs around too, but IMO Inter is a very credible destination to these guys. Pretty consistent CL football I'd say, CL knockouts (most prob) for two years now and possibly good minutes for these guys too.

Current players:

Correa: I can see scenarios where we keep Correa and that's most prob because we can't find buyers. He's at a wrong club and can't get enough out of himself at Inter. I can't see himself having a good future at Inter. Let's hope we can sell him to Spain.

Dzeko: I can see scenarios where we keep Dzeko. And that relates to the scenario where we sell Correa and don't extend Lukaku loan. I can see management thinking we need to keep at least some of the current players in attack to have some continuity. Dzeko would stay at much lower salary. I would hope we won't go there however EVEN IF he's again showed his usefulness this season. He's year older next summer, the age will catch up sooner than later.

Lukaku: Just send him back. I can see management extending the loan (given there is some verbal agreement over doing similar loan) if he tears the league apart after the World Cup. But I just don't want to see it happen, we just need to move on and let it go.

 

[Corrode]

secure new owner and rich first

 

[crzdcolombian]

So basically having Skriniar extend his contract is our best bet for the next transfer window

Or someone buys our team and we actually have money to reinforce

I just hope he don’t do panic extensions for a fringe players.